


Comes with the package

by LeDiz



Category: Transformers (Bay Movies)
Genre: Gen, PTSD, Shock, kind of unfinished, politicians being politicians, sam being... sam, soldiers being soldiers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-20
Updated: 2016-08-20
Packaged: 2018-08-09 22:39:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7820029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LeDiz/pseuds/LeDiz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the first autobot-decepticon skirmish on Earth, Sam Witwicky and the other squishy humans spend the next twelve hours reacting. No wonder most movies leave this bit out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Comes with the package

They were… he was…

Sam looked down at his hands, seared with tiny engraved symbols that pulsed along with his blood. They were already fading, melting from red down to brown and hopefully further on to his own tanned skin, but he could still see them. He could still feel the weight of the cube in his hands.

He looked up at Optimus, who was holding the fragment of AllSpark to his chest and staring off into the sunset, and Sam followed his gaze with a slight flinch of surprise. Sunset… it was Sunday night. He had only bought his car on Friday night. He huffed out a breath, then looked around at Bumblebee. He could make it to school tomorrow.

Bumblebee met his gaze easily, the gears and plates of his face shifting into what was recognisably a smile, before his eyes flickered over Sam’s shoulder, and he jerked forward, only to be held back by the tow truck’s chain. “Michaela!”

Sam spun, but too slow; it was one of Captain Lennox’s men that shot forward, sliding to his knees in the rubble to catch Michaela as she dropped to her knees. She grabbed at the ripped sleeve of his shirt, her breath coming hard and fast as she panted through a wide, terrifying grin.

“She’s going to hyperventilate,” the soldier reported gruffly, but his arms didn’t match his tone, gently guiding her back against his chest so she could both laugh hysterically and gulp mouthfuls of air straight down her windpipe. “It’s okay girl, just keep breathing, let it out.”

“Keep her steady,” Lennox ordered, before marching over to grab Sam by the shoulder. “You okay?”

He just stared at him for a long second, then looked from Bumblebee to Optimus and back to Lennox. “Yes,” he said finally, and the captain frowned.

“You’re going into shock. Robot, uh… Camaro –”

“Bumblebee,” Sam corrected, and Lennox nodded.

“Bumblebee, keep an eye on this one. When he drops, he’s going to drop like a rock,” he said, and then half-guided, half-shoved Sam over to where Bumblebee could hold him. The large metal fingers were mismatched – his left hand was pleasantly cool, the right almost painfully hot. But they curled around him protectively, and he found himself leaning into them, not quite able to do anything else.

Lennox took one of the shortwave radios from his sergeant and held it up to his shoulder, leaning into it as he spoke. “This is Captain William Lennox, wondering where the _fuck_ our support team is! We need ambulances, drivers, liaisons, something to damn well get us outta here now!”

That only made Michaela laugh even harder, tears leaking from her eyes, and the autobots looked down at Bumblebee in confusion. He tilted his head, considering, then looked at Ratchet. “Sensory processor overload. Humans are not designed to experience so much so quickly.”

“It was just a skirmish,” Ironhide said, though even Sam could tell his heart wasn’t in it. His eyes kept shifting between Jazz’s remains and Bumblebee’s nonexistent legs.

“Until two days ago, most of them weren’t aware that other beings existed in the universe,” Ratchet pointed out.

“Giant, alien, transforming robots,” Sam muttered, and Bumblebee gently picked him up, his right hand shifting to support Sam’s legs as he curled the human against his chest.

Sam didn’t remember even closing his eyes, but suddenly, before he even knew they were coming, they were surrounded by men and women in black suits and army gear, taking weapons away from the Rangers and guiding Michaela into an ambulance. One of them unhooked Bumblebee, and Ironhide immediately scooped him up, Sam still in his hands, to set the smaller robot over the crook of his arm.

“We need to take him back to Hoover Dam,” one of the black-suited women protested. “All of you, really.”

“And you shall,” Optimus agreed, but he didn’t make any moves for Ironhide to release his two captives. “But we shall walk there.”

And there’s really no arguing with a gigantic humanoid semi-trailer, so walk they did. Sam spent the whole time listening to Ratchet yell at Bumblebee over the sound of his car’s engine.

It was easier than thinking about it.

 

* * *

 

When they got back to the Hoover Dam, though, there was no keeping Sam in Bumblebee’s arms. Defence Secretary Keller turned to Optimus and ‘politely asked’ that Sam be handed over, and in the interests of their future without having to declare war on the humans, Optimus ordered Bumblebee to let him go.

From there, he was ushered into a small room with a nurse in full army uniform, who smiled at him sympathetically but didn’t make any move to touch him as one of the men in black followed them in. The man had the same ‘do anything I want and get away with it’ badge as Simmons, but he looked like the type of guy who would actually follow through on the threat.

Sam reeled off his story from start to finish, fumbling when he couldn’t remember all the facts about his grandfather, or the time spans between events. But the man seemed to accept his stammered story and, at the end, just nodded and stood up again.

“You’ll be staying at the dam for a while. We’ll be in touch.”

“Hey!” he shouted, before the guy could even touch the door. “What about my parents? My dog? What’s going to happen to the autobots?”

The man just gazed back at him quietly, an almost human look crossing his face. “Your parents are fine; probably already back at home with your dog. As for you and the autobots…” He grimaced, pulling the government mask back into place. “We’ll be in touch.”

He nodded to the nurse, who immediately picked up Sam’s wrist and began bustling about with equipment and muttered numbers. All of Sam’s further protests were cut off by first the door slamming and then a popsicle stick being shoved into his mouth.

The nurse just smiled. “You’ll be able to go home sooner or later.”

“Wha’ a’ou’ ah au’o’o’s?” he demanded, even though his tongue was clamped down with surprising strength. “Wha’ a’ou ’um’e’ee?”

The nurse just kept smiling.

 

* * *

 

Amazingly, the first friendly person he met after being released, now covered in bandages and a little doped up on pain pills, was Agent Simmons. He was sitting on a large crate, ignoring the angry, panicked crowd around him by keeping his eyes shut and chewing on a foot-long Subway sandwich. Without really thinking about it, Sam wandered over to stand beside the crate.

It took a moment, but Simmons seemed to sense his presence, and opened first one eye, and then the other to look at him directly. “You.”

“Yeah. Shouldn’t you be…” Sam gestured to some of the other agents running around, and Simmons smirked.

“Shouldn’t you be with your big alien friends?”

Six hours ago, the response would have made him scowl. But now, looking at Simmons on his huge crate, with his huge sandwich, staring back at him with tiny, tired eyes, Sam just folded his arms over the edge of the crate.

“I don’t know if I’m allowed to.”

“Probably not. If you tried, you’d probably get caught by a scientist wanting to test you for radiation. Or an official wanting to go over your statement.” Simmons took another bite out of his sandwich, then held it out in offering. Sam gazed at it for a second, then climbed up to sit beside him on the crate and take the food.

“Thanks.”

“Mmph.”

They sat in companionable silence for a few seconds, both quietly chewing as they gazed out over the crowd. Nobody seemed to know what they were doing, but they all looked very purposeful about doing it. Files were swapped, orders were barked, repairs were decided on and groups were organised. But beyond that…

“So how come you aren’t in on all this action?” Sam asked, before taking another bite and handing the sandwich back.

He chuckled darkly. “Come on, kid. In all the time you’ve known me, haven’t you learnt a goddamn thing about protocol? I fought the crazy little robot – my objectivity’s been shot. I worked under S-7 – I’m in it big time with Keller. I helped to hide a big alien robot that would’ve destroyed the planet if you and your slightly smaller alien friends hadn’t killed him – my credibility’s screwed. And as a good, obedient agent of a secret agency within the American government, I didn’t do a damn bit of it nice and politely, so the president has placed me in the proverbial shit pile.” He took a bite of the sandwich and leaned back on one hand, pushing his mouthful to one cheek with a smile. “I’ll be lucky to work in a post office, after this.”

“That sucks.”

Simmons smirked, handing the sandwich back. Sam took another bite, chewing thoughtfully, and then looked around at him. “But you were just doing your job.”

“Doesn’t matter. Someone’s gotta be held responsible. Your big alien friends –”

“They’re called ‘autobots’.”

“Hey. I’m narrowly avoiding having a nervous breakdown here, kid. Leave me my insults,” he snapped. “Your _big alien friends_ fought off a bunch of major robots that were only here to help NBE-1, who was only here because of Sector Seven. They can’t be labelled bad guys. You, a stupid seventeen year old kid, saved the whole planet and got rid of the cube, which was responsible for the whole mess. So obviously you aren’t our scape goat. The president can’t be held accountable for an agency he has never officially signed off on. Who the hell would you blame?”

“Someone higher up?”

The chuckle only got darker. “That’s cute, kid. Who exactly did you meet that was ‘higher up’ than me?”

“There was that –”

“Uh-uh. He told you everything you wanted to know, gave you everything you asked for.” Simmons snatched the sandwich back. “Thanks for the vote of confidence, but I’m all for facing facts: I’m pretty much screwed.”

“Oh…”

“So I’m stuck here, just like you. Only I don’t have any big alien friends to protect me from all this,” he said, jerking his head at the crowd before holding up his sandwich again. “I got this crate, and I got this sandwich, and I got the knowledge that I did everything I was ordered and supposed to do in order to defend my country. And I’m making do.”

Sam frowned, not entirely sure how to respond. Six hours ago… hell, about _one_ hour ago, he would’ve figured it was all Simmons deserved. But really, thinking about it… Simmons had always been doing his job. Just because that didn’t fit – just because it wasn’t what Sam, Michaela and the autobots thought was right… none of it was any good reason for him to become the one to blame for all of this. “It just doesn’t seem…”

“Fair?” Simmons supplied, then shook his head. “It ain’t fair, kid. None of it. But hell, I don’t think it was fair that out of all the stinkin’ piles o’ rock on all the godforsaken planets in all the universe, your big alien friends had to pick our country to have their war in.”

“They didn’t –”

“And hey, who we gonna blame for that, huh? Your alien buddies? Who just came here to _protect_ us? NBE-1, who was brought here without knowledge by your great-great Grandpappy? Maybe we should blame him for all this, huh?” He smiled, taking another bite out of the sandwich as he gave Sam an odd look, part smug and part terrified. “Your grandfather to blame for all this, kid? Who _you_ gonna blame, huh?”

Sam just stared at him. “It’s not anybody’s fault. Things just happen.”

“Yeah, you tell that to the three hundred million Americans that’re gonna wake up tomorrow morning, switch on the news and find out Mission City was destroyed by an alien skirmish. You tell that to the families of the hundreds of people that died this weekend. You go walk out that door and tell all the people that were on the highway today that they have to spend all their taxes to repair that road, but won’t get a dime out of the government to repair their car, because it wasn’t anybody’s _fault_. Because things just happen.” Simmons rolled his eyes and sat back again, staring down at his sandwich. “If everyone’s an innocent bystander, then you wouldn’t think anything would happen. People get victimised, sure, but by who? Where’s it start? Who’s the terrorist? Someone has to be. And from day one to now, the only one who’s done something tangible and wrong on some moral level is me. Hum _freakin’_ Hallelujah.”

He glanced at Sam one last time, then let his eyes slide shut, releasing a long, heavy sigh. After a minute, he lifted the sandwich and began chewing, and Sam realised he didn’t want to intrude on Simmon’s carefully-constructed calm.

He slipped off the crate and started walking, without a goddamn clue where he was going.

 

* * *

 

She was hot, and blonde, and had legs from here to Idaho, but Sam was pretty sure he might maybe have a girlfriend after all this, so rather than check her out, he scrambled to remember the name of the woman he’d met in the helicopter. She was standing at the buffet table someone had laid out, poking distastefully as a plate of wieners as she looked along the rest of the table in search of something edible.

“Madison?” he tried, and she looked up, smiled to acknowledge him, then went back to the food.

“Maggie,” she corrected. “Okay, seriously, is there anything on this table that won’t put like ten kilos on my thighs? I mean, really, if they wanted to bribe me with junkfood, they could have at least had the decency to scrub up some Tim-Tams.”

“Tim-Tams?” he repeated blankly, and she groaned.

“Bloody Americans! How the hell is it that I can know exactly what a twinkie is and that there’s no way in hell that I would ever eat one, but you don’t know what the most delicious source of chocolately goodness on the planet is?” she cried, and Sam blinked several times.

“Maybe because you _live_ in America, home of the twinkie, and I’ve never even been to… England?”

She stared at him for a long moment, obviously contemplating whether ruining her heels was worth ramming her stiletto into his eye socket, but apparently fashion won out. She turned back to the buffet. “You’re Sam, right? The kid who bought the alien car and ended up saving the world.”

He shrugged, walking over to join her. “I never figured out how you were involved.”

“I’m a computer analyst,” she said, waving him off with her fork as she moved on from the wieners to investigate some bagels lathered in cream cheese. “I picked up the second hack on the national defence system.”

“The what? When was the defence system hacked?”

“Oh, my god,” she said, rolling her eyes at nothing. “This is my life. I am doomed to a life of having no one know about anything to do with me.”

“No, it’s not that, it’s just that… well, I’ve been kinda preoccupied with the autobots and all and…” He grimaced, trying to catch her eye and apologise. “No one’s really told me what the hell’s been going on.”

“Figures. Well, I guess, in the grand scheme of things, I’m not really that important,” she said, giving up on the bagels and using her fork to lift the lid on a box of doughnuts. She flinched away from them and quickly moved on, while Sam snagged a pink one with sprinkles.

“Noticing a hack in our nation’s defences seems pretty big to me,” he said, and she scrunched her nose.

“That was me and my team. What I did was steal a copy of the hacker’s signature and show it to my friend, Glen.”

“The guy who made the crack about Wolverine,” Sam said, clicking his fingers in memory, and Maggie tsked.

“Oh, sure, Glen gets remembered. Hugh bloody Jackman gets remembered. I get shunted off to the side and bribed with…” Her grumbles faded as she reached a plate of turkey slices covered in a mouth-watering sauce, chunks of berries and fruits clearly visible. “Is this even food, or has someone already thrown it up and put it back on the plate?”

“What are you talking about? That looks great!” he cried, but she just glared at him, only to have any response cut off by Glen’s sudden appearance on the other side of the table.

“Dude, I am so suing this Sector Seven bullshit for a new wardrobe!” he ranted, grabbing a bagel but apparently only to gesture with. “That little robot mother ripped straight clean through this, man! This is my favourite shirt!”

“Dammit, Glen, there are more things in life than you sticking to your perfectly ordered life!” Maggie yelled, throwing down both her plate and fork. “Argh! I need Cadburys and coffee!”

And with that, she immediately stormed off far better than Sam thought anyone could while wearing heels like that, and he turned to stare at Glen, who just gazed after his friend with a look of quiet contemplation.

“Is that… normal? For her?” asked Sam, and Glen pursed his lips, looking at him sideways.

“How the hell am I supposed to know? Have you seen her apartment? It’s like a freaking bomb hit it, man. She don’t make sense _normally_ , let alone when the world just got saved from giant alien robots.” He hesitated, then grinned, waving his bagel. “How totally X-Files is this whole thing?”

As Glen began rambling about alien abductions and government conspiracies, Sam stared down at Maggie’s spotless plate, and wondered whether, even if there had been a gigantic plate full of these ‘Tim-Tam’ things, she would have touched them, either.

 

* * *

 

It was kind of weird when he stumbled across the Army Rangers. Five of them were sitting in what they probably thought a circle looked like, considering the number of beer bottles sitting with them. Captain Lennox was among them, and he waved at Sam to join them.

“Hey, oi, kid!” he yelled, his pitch wavering as if it couldn’t pick an octave. “Come – come tell these guys what a gog- dog – guys, help me out here…”

“Goddamn hero!” the other soldiers sang, and Will made a motion with his fingers that he probably intended to be a click.

“Tha’s right. Tell these guys what a great soldier you are, yeah.”

“Where’d you get the beer?” he asked, and one of the soldiers laughed.

“The kid wants in!”

“We won’t stop him! Here, kid, have the rest of mine! I want something colder,” another said, putting his bottle down in a particularly careful fashion before crawling toward a box in the middle of their circle.

Will reached out and snatched the abandoned bottle away before Sam could even move. “No!” he ordered, and sat up straighter. “As the responsible parent of the six of you –”

“Four,” Sam corrected, and Will frowned, swaying in his seat.

“Well, as the responsible parent commander of this here unit, I say that the overdefensive receptionist gave us this beer so that we might drink it responsibly!” he said, and then turned his bleary glare on Sam. “That means that, as the commanding parent I am, I am accepting you to be underage, and therefore not okay to drink any of the overdefensive receptionist’s beer.”

Sam opened his mouth to point out that he didn’t actually want any, was looking for the autobots, and wasn’t entirely sure what an overdefensive receptionist was, but Will waved at him again before he could.

“But! As a fellow soldier, I am accepting you to have just gone through your first fucking scary battle, and therefore in a perfect position to get completely trashed with us.” He held out the bottle. “Kampai, soldier!”

“Kampai!” the other rangers yelled, before knocking their heads back and drinking deeply.

“Right…” he said slowly, then looked around. “Hey, where’s Sergeant Epps?”

“Epps…?” Will repeated, before looking around at the others. “Dusty!”

“ _Sir_!” one of the soldiers snapped out a salute, and Will focussed on the movement.

“Where is Technical Sergeant Epps?”

“Beating the crap out of the boxing bag the overdefensive receptionist commandeered for us, _sir_!”

“Excellent recon, Dusty!” He turned back to Sam, all business, then managed a sloppy grin and pointed to a door over to their left. “He’s in there.”

“I wouldn’t bug him, kid,” one of the more sober rangers said, leaning on one knee and gazing up at Sam with a surprisingly gentle look. “Some of us like to remember the friends we lost and the battle we fought with a strong drink. Others talk it out. Some just scream into a dark room. But then, people like Epps… some guys just beat up the things they couldn’t protect their friends from.”

“Again, and again, and again,” Will said, his smile a little torn around the edges. “And once he’s beaten that scorpion monster enough times, he’ll come out here and have a drink, and we’ll toast my Second in Command. But until then, we’re soldiers—” The group shouted wordlessly. “—and Rangers—” They lifted their drinks with another shout. “—and we beat a mother of a giant alien robot into the _goddamn ground_!” All of them yelled in triumph and slammed the necks of their bottles together, before leaning back and drinking again.

Sam left them to it.

He knew, the second that Will grabbed him by the shirt and told him, “ _You’re a soldier now_!” that he wasn’t. He would always fight for his home and his family and his world and his friends, but he wasn’t a soldier.

Or, at least, he wasn’t one of them.

 

* * *

 

It took a few hours, but Sam eventually figured out where the autobots were being kept: the gigantic hangar that had originally held the AllSpark. Originally, he tried to just walk in, and when he was stopped, he explained who he was and that he just wanted to hang out with his friends.

Yeah… that didn’t work.

So he glared at the security guard and stalked off in search of one of his brand new, high-end government contacts. Simmons just looked at him again, and Sam realised that he was right – anything Simmons said might actually make things a whole heap worse. The agent then pointed out that he was pretty sure he saw Defence Secretary Keller an hour ago, and waved in the vague direction he’d gone.

Unfortunately, when Sam finally did find him, another hour later, the Secretary was sitting behind a desk piled high with reports and documents, and the man looked tired beyond belief. After so many hours of thinking of him as one of the good guys, Sam really hoped that was the reason he was acting like such a prick now.

“Sorry, son, but the autobots are undergoing their own debriefing right now. Don’t think you should really disturb them,” he said, tapping his pen against a diagram of Megatron’s head. “Soldier’s prerogative.”

“It’s been like, ten hours,” he argued. “They’ve gotta be done by now.”

“Those boys seem to operate on their own time scale,” Keller said vaguely. “Not really surprising – big guys, long lives… an hour to us is probably a second to them.”

“Well – well, I was a part of their involvement,” he said, scrabbling for a foothold. Somehow, he didn’t think his WWJD argument would go down well with the Defence Secretary. “So, you know, I should be, like, in there, briefing them down on my side of the story, right?”

“Why don’t you go get some rest, huh? It’s the middle of the night, and you’ve been through quite an ordeal,” Keller leaned forward, lacing his fingers in front of his face. “Has the doctor talked to you about what happened, yet? You could be in shock.”

“I’m not in shock!” he snapped. “I just want to go talk to my friends and make sure they’re okay!”

“And you will. But first, I think it’d be a good idea if you got some sleep,” he said, and Sam twitched at the irritatingly paternal tone of his voice. “How long’s it been since you lay down? It must be something like twenty hours.”

His brain provided the response before he could even think that he didn’t want to know. It was more like thirty-six. “Look, I’m fine. I usually black out after taking more than a couple asprin, and that doctor put me on a bunch of pain meds, but I’m still up and alert,” he snapped, and only scowled deeper when Keller’s eyebrows met in concern. “If I’m upset, it’s because I’m being held hostage and separate from my friends! I want to talk to the autobots!”

“Mary?” Keller asked, as a woman came in carrying a cup of coffee. She blinked at him, then around at Sam as the Secretary pointed at him. “Could you show Sam here to a bunk? I really think you need to lie down and get some rest, son.”

“I don’t want rest!” he shouted. “Not until I make sure Bumblebee’s okay!”

“The one you bought as a car?” he asked, then waved it off. “He’s fine. None of the autobots seemed too concerned about his injury.”

“His legs were ripped off!” he yelled, and then yanked his arm away when Mary tried to take it. “And that’s not what I’m talking about! I’m talking about what your people here did to him! I’m talking about the fact that none of you will let me in to see him! I want to talk to them! I want to make sure you’re not going to deep freeze them like you did Megatron!”

“They saved our planet, son, we’re not –”

“Bumblebee saved me heaps of times before you guys _tortured_ him! The only reason I can’t see you doing it now is because it won’t look good when I go to the press!”

Keller gazed back at him silently for a few seconds, his fatherly expression replaced with the blank stare of a politician. He then nodded to Mary before fixing Sam with cold eyes. “Now, son, I am going to pretend you didn’t say that. You’re tired, and in shock, and you’ve got every right to be scared. But once you’ve had some rest and something to eat, I can guarantee you’re gonna see what’s going on here in a much better light. It’s all gonna make sense in the morning. So you just go on with Mary and get some sleep. Alright?”

Mary took his arm again, and this time, her grip was stronger than he had thought possible. She met his gaze as they turned, and he suddenly thought that maybe he was acting like a child, since that was the look he was getting from everyone. But then she started guiding him out of the room, and he decided that even if he was acting like a child, so were the people watching him, so what the hell did it matter.

If they were going to treat him like a child – ground him and send him to his bedroom, then he was damn well going to respond in kind. He was climbing out the window first chance he got.

 

* * *

 

His chance came surprisingly quickly. All he had to do was ask Mary what the chances of getting some food were.

“Look, if you’re going to make me sleep, then you’re going to have to make it easy on me, you know? I can’t – I can’t sleep with all this noise and stress and I’m hungry, so, you know, you and the guards and the people everywhere, they’re really hard on me when I don’t have some food in me. You guys haven’t fed me since you arrested me last night, this is – this is child abuse. This is –”

“Okay!” Mary cried, holding up a hand to stem the tide. “Okay, calm down. How about a nice turkey sandwich? Or a hamburger? Will that help?”

“Yes. Yes, that would help,” he said, nodding rapidly as he looked around. There were guards outside the sleeping bay, but they all looked pretty casual. Sam had the feeling they just happened to be sitting there, rather than guarding him, and it was really only Mary keeping him in. “That would help a lot.”

“Okay. I’ll go and get you something. You just lie down and try and get some rest until then, okay?”

She said ‘okay’ a lot. All the government types liked to reaffirm everything. Everything was ‘okay’ and ‘alright’ and did Sam ‘understand’. It was kind of creepy. But hey, it got rid of her, so he went and sat down on the bunk, watching the way she eyed him before turning and walking away. Once she was out of sight, he stood up again and walked out.

“Hey, I thought that chick said you were going to sleep,” one of the guards called, and Sam paused, scratching his neck to stall for time.

“I – I am. Was. I just – nature calling, you know? Bathroom. Couldn’t really ask her where it was, you know? Girl. Kinda embarrassing.”

He snorted, then gestured with his gun. “Through those doors, down the stairs, turn right. Pretty clearly marked.”

“Thanks,” he said, and then hightailed it out of there. Since he couldn’t go back past Keller’s office, it took him a little longer to find the hangar again, and when he did, it was purely by accident. He was just wandering around, trying familiar-looking doors when he suddenly found himself in the viewing chamber, watching as Ratchet clocked Bumblebee over the head with what looked like a really, really big screwdriver.

Sam couldn’t hear what they were saying, but it didn’t matter. They were there, and alive! He rushed over to the glass and pressed his hands against it, staring out at his friends. Optimus was sitting on one of the generators, staring at something in his hands, while Ironhide stood off to the side, one hand curled in the wires and air vents overhead. The two halves of Jazz lay on the platform the cube had once hung over, with Bumblebee and Ratchet beside it, apparently arguing about something. As he watched, Bumblebee yanked himself backward, but his lack of legs made it impossible to avoid Ratchet sticking the screwdriver in his face the way Sam’s mother sometimes did with a spatula. Clearly, Bumblebee was getting a lecture.

Sam stared around the office, then grinned when he saw a door that led to what kind of looked like a fire escape, down into the hangar. His smile faded when he realised it was locked. Even if he’d been the type of guy strong enough to do it, his busted ankles and shoulders made the idea of knocking the door down kind of a joke. He frowned, looking around at all the buttons surrounding the window.

“Maybe there’s a… hah!” He rushed over to the microphone on the desk, flicking the switch attached to it. Immediately, the office was filled with the sounds of gears grinding and the strange, musical screeching beeps that Sam could vaguely identify as Cybertronian. “Hey, guys!”

“Sam?” It was still weird to hear Bumblebee’s voice. The older, almost bookish sounding voice didn’t really match Sam’s idea of his friend, even without all the computerised static that accompanied it.

“Yeah! I’m up here in the viewing box,” he said, waving when all four robots turned to look at him. Bumblebee jerked toward him, then jerked back as the screwdriver flashed in front of his face again. Sam grinned. “I don’t think you’re supposed to move, buddy.”

“Samuel Witwicky,” Optimus greeted. “I thought you were being sequestered by your officials for examination.”

“Yeah, I was, and now I’m supposed to be sleeping. I’m definitely not supposed to see you guys,” he said, and then pointed to the door. “You think you guys can take that door off its hinges? I wanna come in.”

They exchanged glances, and Bumblebee leaned toward his commanding officer. “Optimus, I’m sure the humans –”

“If I have to tell you to switch off that capacitor one more time…” Ratchet threatened, making Bumblebee lean back again, while Ironhide untangled his hand and walked over to the door.

“In the interests of maintaining a working relationship with the humans, Optimus, I say we bring the boy in here,” he said, and Optimus nodded.

“Sometimes diplomacy is better served after first having defied agreements of cooperation,” he agreed, and Sam frowned, trying to figure out how that worked, before Ironhide suddenly turned and ripped off the door to the chamber. Sam grinned and hurried out to join them.

“Hey! I was told you guys were all debriefing and wouldn’t want to see me!”

“Ah, how interesting,” said Ratchet, reaching out to cup Sam in one massive hand and hold him up for examination. “We were informed that you would be in need of medical attention and unable to see us for many of your days.”

“Were you badly injured?” asked Optimus, and Sam shrugged with his head, since moving his relocated shoulders hurt a hell of a lot more than keeping them still.

“I’ll be fine.”

“Scanners show he is internally damaged,” Ratchet reported, and Sam scowled.

“Well, yeah, but nothing life threatening. Bruises and aches, mostly. How’s Bumblebee?”

“ _It’s just a flesh wound_!” a soundbyte declared, and Sam glanced at his friend, then back at Ratchet.

“How’s Bumblebee?”

Bumblebee clicked loudly, but everyone ignored him. Ratchet touched his chin, then shrugged one shoulder. “I have performed some minor repairs to stabilise his energon and energy flow, but until I am allowed to return to the battlefield and salvage his legs, there is little I can do. In much the same way, although the AllSpark seems to have repaired the major structural damage in his voice capacitor, it is still not working at full capacity, and it will take time for it to fully heal. Perhaps many stellar cycles. Any repair work I attempt may only inflict more damage, and there is no telling how long AllSpark repairs take. It is not something that has been done in any of our lifetimes.”

“In other words, I’m fine, Sam,” Bumblebee interjected, only to yelp as Ratchet threw another glare his way, hefting the screwdriver.

“If he could keep his capacitor offline for more than a nano-klik, it would actually have time to heal!”

“Ah, calm down, Ratchet,” Ironhide said, trudging over to stand beside him and look down at Sam. “It’s been vorns since he’s been able to use the thing; let him.”

Sam smiled at the long pause that followed this, with Bumblebee glancing around at each of the autobots. Eventually, he gaze turned back to Ratchet, and he slumped, quite clearly deciding talking was not worth the lectures. Sam looked around as well, his eyes lingering on Jazz.

“Is there really nothing you can do?” he asked, and they all followed his gaze, Ratchet sighing heavily.

“Perhaps. The actual restructuring of his system is not difficult. Possibly even easier than it will be to reattach Bumblebee’s legs, as the waist is much more pliable than the lower leg units,” he said, his tone dry and clinical. “The issue is the matter of his spark.”

Sam looked over at Bumblebee, whose optics had dimmed, his wings slowly losing their bouyancy. Ratchet noticed Sam’s gaze and lowered him to the ground, where he quickly walked over to touch Bumblebee’s damaged leg.

“The retrieval of a faded spark is not unheard of, but it is… difficult,” Optimus said wearily. “It usually requires the work of several highly trained medical units.”

“But Ratchet –” Sam began, but this time it was Ironhide to cut him off.

“Good as he is, Ratchet’s a medic, not a medical unit,” he pointed out. “He’s on this team because he can stablise you and he can do it fast. He’s not a miracle worker.”

Sam hesitated, then looked up at Bumblebee, who just gazed back at him in silence. After a moment, Sam rubbed his hand over his face, suddenly tired. “So… so what’re you guys gonna do now? I know you said Bumblebee could stay with me, but…”

“It depends on your government,” said Optimus. “We would prefer to stay here, recuperate and rebuild our forces. But that may not be an option.”

Ironhide looked up and around at Optimus, and his next words sounded as if they were continuing a discussion from earlier. “We need to contact the Ark. Even if Megatron is destroyed, the Decepticon Forces are not. At the very least, Starscream will still be functioning, and he will easily build a force to surpass our unit.”

“Their loyalty to Megatron will become a cause for revenge,” Ratchet agreed. “We may have ended the battle for the AllSpark, but the war is not yet over. The longer we remain here, the more we put the humans at risk.”

“The humans are already at risk,” Optimus argued. “The decepticons know we allied with the humans, and are deeply aware that it was Sam who carried the AllSpark. They may even suspect it was he who destroyed Megatron.”

“There are still decepticons on Earth, many of them loyal to Megatron, even in death,” Bumblebee added. “They’re going to come after Sam. I don’t only wish to stay here to stay with him, but to protect him. He needs it.”

“Mute it,” Ratchet snapped, but Bumblebee ignored him, cupping his hand around Sam’s back.

“The war must be waged somewhere. The decepticons will attack here, no matter how much we try to stop them. I have no objection to moving the war away, to another galaxy in preference, but we must leave some forces behind, or the Earth will fall.” He hesitated, glancing down at Sam, then switched to his own language until Sam slammed his fist into Bumblebee’s thigh plating.

“Hey! I know when I’m being talked about! English, Bee!”

Bumblebee paused, then sighed and started again, focussed on Sam instead. “My experiences on this planet have taught me many things about your species. But the most concerning, the part I do not wish you to know, is that you would make excellent…” He stopped, then looked up at Optimus again. “If this planet fell to Decepticon control, they would not wipe out the humans. They would defeat them, yes, and destroy many, but not all. Humans are strong, pliable, fuel efficient. They learn quickly and adapt well. I believe, were the decepticons to claim this planet, that the humans would become slaves. And with human resources at their disposal, I believe that… that the Decepticon Forces would become unstoppable.”

Silence greeted this statement, the other three autobots staring at him in silence. Eventually, Optimus asked, “Is this an extract from your final report?”

“It is… a censored extract,” he admitted, static clogging the words. “For the reasons of present company.”

“Slag,” Ironhide said loudly, and Ratchet sighed, turning away.

“What do you mean, censored?” asked Sam.

“It means I will not elaborate with a human in the room, Sam,” said Bumblebee, but the static was rising above his voice, so that he skipped every other consonate, and his head jerked at the end, turning Sam’s name into a high-pitched squawk. The autobot winced, touching his neck, and switched to soundbytes. “ _I’m sorry, but you were never supposed to know_.”

“So, Lieutenant,” Optimus said, making Sam jerk his head around in shock as Bumblebee looked up. “I should take this extract to be an informal request to outfit the planet Earth with an autobot base, with anticipation of a formal reccomendation?”

Bumblebee nodded once, and Ironhide put a hand to his chin, considering.

“It might be ideal to make this _our_ new base, Optimus. If Bumblebee’s right about the humans, we can’t risk losing this planet.”

“And if the decepticons find some way to ressurect and restore Megatron, they will do so here,” Ratchet agreed without turning around. “We need to be prepared and ready for them.”

“We’ll need a full squadron,” Ironhide continued. “Prowl. Wheeljack. An aerial bot or two – we know Starscream’s coming back and we will need fliers to confront him.”

“I could always use First Aid’s assistance,” Ratchet interjected. “As much as I hesitate to say it, Red Alert would also be useful in the construction of a base.”

“Sideswipe and Sunstreaker?” Bumblebee croaked, and shrugged when they all stared at him. “If this ends up being the frontline…”

“He’s right,” Ironhide grumbled, before looking up at Optimus again. “We might end up needing the firepower.”

Optimus sighed, waving it all off wearily. “These are all important suggestions for an important discussion, but it all relies on the humans allowing us to remain here. The way they attempted to keep us away from Sam implies that they are not willing to make such a decision as of yet.”

“It would be useful if they made any decision,” Ratchet said irritably, before wandering away to investigate some of the equipment surrounding them. Sam watched him for a moment, then turned back to Bumblebee.

“Were all those names friends of yours?”

“ _Soldiers, fighting on the front lines,_ ” a soundbyte explained, before his facial plates shifted into what passed for a smile. “ _That makes us family_.”

“Prowl is my Second in Command,” Optimus provided. “He’s a strategist, whose logic circuits often override his ability to operate. Wheeljack is an expert mechanic, providing aid to Ratchet and inventing many things for our base.”

“When they work,” Ironhide added. “First Aid’s Ratchet’s apprentice, and Red Alert is a paranoid Security Expert.”

“What about Sideswipe and Sunstreaker?” Sam asked, rolling his shoulders to hold back a yawn, only to have his shoulderblades meet Bumblebee’s hand and invite him to lean back against the supporting weight. “Does ‘firepower’ mean they’re good fighters?”

“They’re psychopathic twins,” Ironhide snapped, before smirking at Ratchet’s back. “Our medic adopted them a few hundred vorns ago.”

“I’d sooner see them both melted into scrap!”

“Excellent frontline fighters, both,” Optimus continued, before hesitating with a smile. “Off-duty, however, they can be somewhat…”

“Off-duty? _Off-duty_!” Ratchet screeched, spinning in place. “It doesn’t matter whether they’re on or off duty, they still get themselves into more trouble than either of them are worth on the battlefield! The number of times I’ve had to patch them up because they were doing something reckless –”

Bumblebee snickered, only to click alarmingly when Ratchet finally snapped and threw his screwdriver right at Bumblebee’s head. The smaller autobot only just managed to duck in time, but Ratchet still glared at him.

“I don’t want to hear anything from you on the subject. The only difference between the three of you is that you’re always getting into trouble for ‘the sake of the mission’, whereas they’re just trying to drive me glitchy.”

“He’s not kidding,” Ironhide told Sam.

“Sideswipe is something of a prankster,” explained Optimus. “He often persuades his brother to join him in the game, which can lead to disaster once the two of them have been discovered.”

Ratchet continued ranting, though his voice made it sound more like a lecture. The stray thought made him realise just how much Ratchet reminded him of his science teacher, and Sam let his thoughts drift along that train of thought. He probably wasn’t going to school this week. That was probably a good thing, since he had an essay due for English on Monday. Was _Romeo and Juliet_ a tragedy, a love story, or a comment on the social condition?

“I haven’t watched the movie yet,” he realised, and everything went blissfully dark.

 

* * *

 

“ _I can smell you, boy_!”

Running. Keep running. It doesn’t matter what’s behind you, just keep running. All that matters is getting to the roof.

“ _Give me the AllSpark and I may let you live to be my pet._ ”

Claws, teeth, all metal, so much metal. Hands cupped around you, holding you steady and safe and not supporting you at all as you are thrown back and forth before being finally tossed away.

“ _Humans are strong, pliable, fuel efficient._ ”

There’s a boy staring at you. He can’t be more than six. And he’s lying in the middle of the street, just staring at you. There’s something red pooling around his neck and mouth. Fuel, your mind supplies vaguely.

“ _You still fight for the weak, and that is why you lose!_ ”

The cube is life. The cube is energy. You can feel it in your hands, and there, above you, is Megatron’s source energy.

“ _I will sacrifice myself._ ”

Your father points at you, raising his eyebrows meaningfully as he tries to tell you something important. But you don’t care, because you’re six, and lying in the middle of the street with fuel dripping from your mouth.

“ _No sacrifice, no victory: the old Witwicky motto. Yeah Dad, I got it._ ”

Connect the energy to the energy, sacrifice everything, risk everything, find victory. Victory for Bumblebee, with his stolen voice and crushed legs. Victory for Michaela, with her crappy life and her crappy boyfriend and her criminal record. Victory for Optimus, who can’t look so tired when he’s made of metal. Victory for Jazz, for Ratchet, for Ironhide.

“ _Car chooses the driver. It’s a mystical bond between man and machine._ ”

Victory for Samuel James Witwicky, who was never anyone special. Who has to rely on his smart mouth to get an A. Who can’t get a steady job because he can’t keep his mouth shut. Who is seventeen and has never kissed a girl. Who sucks at sports but can run so far, so fast, because he’s got a reason. Who never did anything his whole life, except put his great-great grandfather’s glasses on eBay and buy a car who rather violently refused to let him buy anything else. Victory for the boy who could be something else.

“ _You’re a soldier now!_ ”

Sacrifice Samuel James Witwicky and push the cube up. Feel it burn into your hands but don’t you ever let go until it’s all gone because you have to finish the sacrifice. You have to have victory. It’s burning and crushing and don’t you dare let go even as you feel the cube explode into your fingers because you will sacrifice –

 

* * *

 

He sat up with a strangled gasp, scrabbling at the smooth cloth beneath him. Something glinted overhead and he panicked, not remembering a thing except big teeth and terrifying claws.

“Get away from me!” he screeched, kicking and rolling, only to hit hard concrete and jar himself out of the dream. He blinked, then looked up to find Bumblebee’s concerned gaze staring back at him. “Bumblebee?”

“Are you awake now?” he asked worriedly. “You were talking in your sleep.”

“It – I just…” He swallowed hard, looking around him. He had been lying on a cot beside Bumblebee, who was now surrounded by shattered peices of yellow metal and the thick corded wires that made up an autobot’s insides. The other three autobots were seated nearby, watching him with a mix of concern and curiosity, and Captain Lennox was leaning against Ironhide’s leg, his eyes narrowed but knowing. Sam blushed at the audience, then checked again to make sure nobody female had seen his panic attack. “I just had a nightmare.”

“Par for the course,” Will said calmly. “Welcome to the wonderful world of Post Fucking Scary Battle Syndrome. Your free pass comes complete with scars and night terrors.”

“Great,” Sam groaned, dragging himself back up onto the cot. “Anything good in the package?”

“Well, if you weren’t seventeen, and the battle hadn’t been with giant alien robots, I’d say the respect of your peers. As it stands… no,” he said bluntly, then offered a wry smile. “You got my respect, though, kid.”

“And mine,” Bumblebee added.

At first, Sam could only stare at them, before his head bobbed, once, twice, and then several more times as he slowly turned his gaze down to his shoes.

Honestly, if this was the whole package so far, he kind of wanted a refund.

**Author's Note:**

> This was last touched in 2008. I feel like more was coming, but nothing ever did. And so it sits in my unfinished fic file, and gets posted here, for people's interest or if they should wish to adopt it.


End file.
